Zero no Tsukaima - Volume 22 illustrations

Heaven and Earth serve as the guesthouse for all living things, with Time being the sojourner since time immemorial.

As with the difference between dreaming and awakening, the distinction between life and death is diverse and confused, and changing.

What awaits us beyond time, once we have transcended life and death, heaven and earth?

“When I opened my eyes, I found myself as a character in a game. It was bewildering, but I thought it was worth a try. That was until I saw the skill given to me. It was [Opening Eyes], with no abilities whatsoever.”The story starts with the MC playing a game that is “Very Difficult”, so difficult, in fact, that no one has ever managed to kill the last boss. After 18 years of playing and, having the best attempt be at 30% of the last boss’s HP, he decides to try out a character that he never used.This character was the Slit-Eyed character. It had garbage stats and garbage traits. But, since the MC had ran out of options with every other character, he was trying to see if he could find any secrets with this new character. So he puts in his name ‘Zero’ and presses play… Only to find himself inside the game, as the Slit-Eyed character.

10 years ago, after “the Gate” that connected the real world with the monster world opened, some of the ordinary, everyday people received the power to hunt monsters within the Gate. They are known as “Hunters”. However, not all Hunters are powerful. My name is Sung Jin-Woo, an E-rank Hunter. I’m someone who has to risk his life in the lowliest of dungeons, the “World’s Weakest”. Having no skills whatsoever to display, I barely earned the required money by fighting in low-leveled dungeons… at least until I found a hidden dungeon with the hardest difficulty within the D-rank dungeons! In the end, as I was accepting death, I suddenly received a strange power, a quest log that only I could see, a secret to leveling up that only I know about! If I trained in accordance with my quests and hunted monsters, my level would rise. Changing from the weakest Hunter to the strongest S-rank Hunter!

Once Gu Qingjiu, she was fortunate enough to be born in the “best” family, ended up having a miserable and unjust life.

Reliving her life once more, Gu Qingjiu chooses to enlist in the military and bear the toughest hardships she has ever faced. Everyone says that she’s the least possible person to join the special forces. However, she manages to prove all of them wrong.

Good-for-nothing? Who’s the good-for-nothing? Is she a good-for-nothing when she can throw all of them onto the floor in a fight? Is she a good-for-nothing when she has results better than everyone else? She’ll prove all of them wrong.

Enter Helian Niancheng, the well-known, youngest major-general in Beijing. A banishment sends him into the basic ranks in a military camp as a new recruit. From then on, he meets a person that makes him dote on and protect at all costs, his beloved. However, his beloved is only focused on fighting and killing. Major-general Helian declares this to be a very bad, a very terrible situation. Yet, Gu Qingjiu merely replies,

“Scram! Lower your gun if you dare!”